Maker of devices for Houston surgeons dead at 88

Updated 9:54 pm, Friday, May 18, 2012

Lou Feldman began working at Baylor in 1959 and remained there until he retired in 1992. (Baylor College of Medicine)

Lou Feldman began working at Baylor in 1959 and remained there until he retired in 1992. (Baylor College of Medicine)

Maker of devices for Houston surgeons dead at 88

1 / 1

Back to Gallery

Lou Feldman was on the front lines as heart surgery came of age in Houston, a time when swashbuckling surgeons accomplished things that once seemed unimaginable.

Feldman, who died May 11 at age 88, tried to stay in the background as manager of the surgery machine shop at Baylor College of Medicine. But his work was everywhere.

"People were amazed at what he could create," said Dr. George Noon, a cardiovascular surgeon who worked with Feldman for years. "He made instruments that were used in the operating room. He developed operating room tables. He built the first heart-lung machines that we used."

He moved to Houston in the 1950s with his wife, Lore Feldman, and their two young daughters, Naomi and Claudia.

Like those who have come to Houston before and since, he came in search of work and a better life, said his son, David Feldman, who was born after the family arrived in Texas.

Feldman began working at Baylor in 1959 and remained there until he retired in 1992.

In an oral history project for Baylor's archives, he described working with DeBakey.

"Usually he would call me and I'd run over to the office. He would say, 'I need this or that.' ... The mere fact that I was working for Dr. DeBakey gave me sort of credibility with the rest of the school."

Feldman held several patents and was listed as co-author on a number of scientific publications.

He worked with Dr. David Yawn, a professor of pathology at Baylor, on the Baylor Rapid Intra-operative Transfusion Device in the 1980s, when Baylor was first starting to commercialize its scientists' inventions.

The precursor to the device captured and cleaned blood lost during surgery but was too slow to be practical, Yawn said. Yawn suggested changes, and Feldman and his team produced a new machine, cutting the processing time from 15 minutes to two or three.

"Lou was a genius," Yawn said. "He would actually cry when he found out one of the things he had created was helping patients. He loved that."

Feldman earned a degree in physics from the University of Houston in 1971, attending night classes while working full time.

'Great humility'

Yawn said many of the instruments Feldman designed were later commercialized.

"He might have been able to take more credit, but he had great humility," he said. "But he knew he could do the job. He never hesitated from a challenge."

But that era is gone.

"Some of the things we did would be very difficult with the present rules," Noon said. "Back in those days, a lot of things were created which would be impossible financially or timewise to come up with now and get approved."

After his retirement, Feldman returned to the passion for painting he had put aside when he married and began to raise a family.

His son said Feldman and his wife also were patrons of other arts, including the symphony, the opera and the ballet. And he remained active in progressive political causes.

"He was always on the side of the disadvantaged," David Feldman said.

Services are set for 11 a.m. Monday at the University of Houston's A.D. Bruce Religion Center, 3801 Cullen Blvd.

Latest from the Chron.com Homepage

Click below for the top news from around the Houston area and beyond. Sign up for our newsletters to be the first to learn about breaking news and more. Go to 'Sign In' and 'Manage Profile' at the top of the page.